Vertical farming, the best solution to support an ever growing population or just a scam?
IMHO it has a lot of potential but not being able to grow grains really is something that should be tackled sooner rather than later. But I could see this being used by self sustaining communities to provide lots of food while using very little space. And it's technically more environmentally friendly than just using vast stretches of land to produce the same amount of food.
Honestly, this seems like a solution looking for a problem. We already have a lot of agricultural space available and in use. We just use that space very inefficiently to actually produce food. There are huge benefits to be gained from switching to sustainable farming, and probably a largely vegan diet too (just based on Ressource use alone). Once farming is focused on producing food and preserving nature, instead of creating profit we can look to further improvements. Even hydroponics or mixed use gardens are likely a better next step here. There simply isn't a need to cram our food production onto a wall yet, especially if that requires costly infrastructure made of difficult to recycle materials.
While I generally agree, I think you are over-looking transportation needs and all the externalities associated with that. Vertical farms can be for apartments, what backyard gardening is to less densely populated places.
Vertical suburbs? Less dense cities in turn increase transportation needs again.
I also think transportation is a rather insignificant part of food production, based on the stats and graphs I've seen.
Why would they be less dense? The entire point of vertical farms is that they can be fit into places without decreasing density of housing.
The just in time delivery transport needs and related food-waste is quite significant for the type of highly perishable produce these vertical farms can provide. I think the stats you saw are for the entire food sector.
As I understand the concept, it is basically farms between houses, in houses. There's an opportunity cost: You could also have people living in that space.
I believe housing people is better than housing crops, for social reasons (housing prices high), but also due to economies of scale. A denser urban area makes all utilities and public transport more efficient.
Walkable cities are worth striving for. Some things like living, working, social activities cannot be outsourced without breaking that concept. Delivery with goods can be outsourced.
Does the farm have to be within town, is it more important than other things which could be in the same place? A truck can drive quite a distance in a few hours, which is short enough for perishable goods.
The type of vertical farms most people are talking about are under-ground or on roof-tops and occupy next to no space that could otherwise be used for housing.
The roads required for trucks take up more space in cities than those vertical farms would.
I see your point, but I do still think that vertical farming has its place in a solarpunk future maybe not in the sense of mass production but more personal like a veg garden or something similar.
Sidenote better than hydroponics is aquaponics providing more and better quality food.
https://youtu.be/D182B6C_WCc